Lights out for `green jobs’ generator

Solyndra, a California manufacturer of solar panels that received more than a half billion in federal stimulus funds, has said it will fire its more than 1,000 workers and file for bankruptcy. So much for the green jobs and prosperity that President Obama and company officials promised in this lovefest from last year:

28 Responses

I have the perfect job for the 1000 laid off workers: Unicorn flatulence technicians and pixie dust collectors. Everyone knows we can generate 110% of our future energy needs using these two methods alone. Solar power — that’s so 20th century.

If you want solar panels the place to get them is China. Where else? Those folks work a lot cheaper than we do. Globalization…leveling the playing field. Now if we could just figure out a way to use all of those i-Pads out there to generate solar energy when not being used for their other purpose, entertainment, that would generate a few megawatts.

exactly. Spain recently pulled the plug on a lot of the subsidies, iirc each 50k per year ‘green’ job that was created cost the taxpayers over 250k in gov’t subsidies. EACH. Someday we’ll wise up. But don’t hold your breath.

Uhuh, if global trade with China has so benefitted us why are we broke and in debt up to our eyeballs and China’s main worry is where to invest all their money?????????????? If you look at the loss of millions of good jobs and the flattening/lowering of our incomes, trade with China has been a disaster for this country.

The problem was that we didn’t invest enough in solar to make it competitive with China. We should step up our investments in solar just like the subsidies the US government has made and continues to make supporting the petroleum industry here.

No fan of Obama but your smug tone is idiotic. No manufacturing interest can compete against Chinese state-supported entities with essentially unlimited budgets, no environmental controls, and low wages.

If we had single-payer health care for all we might be able to compete industrially, as Germany does, but we don’t. So while you take lazy political shots, yet another American factory closes with jobs that de facto have been shipped to China. Congratulations, Loren Steffy, you win.

And yet when Obama and the Democrats look to cut spending they can only target Medicare and Social Security. I wonder how much of the half billion went in to the pockets of the “investors” and how much was given as a campaign contribution for Obama.

I wonder if Obama will mention this failure in his “Jobs” speech on September 8
I wonder how many other failed initiatives he will recycle in the speech and how many other “shovel ready” projects are now shelved.
I wonder how long he will extend welfare/ unemployment for his fellow Democrats.

HP spent $1.8 billion to buy Palm last year for their webOS operating system,and is now getting out of the smartphone and tablet business which used it. Don’t act as if the government doesn’t have a clue, this kind of stuff happens all the time in business.

Solyndra’s demise is prime example of the shortcomings of the centralized economic control so favored by the Obama administration. When any politically driven entity picks economic winners and losers, economic disaster is the most likely outcome. Witness Solyndra, half a billion dollars down the drain. And for what? – Obama’s politically motivated green energy pipe dream.

The chief economic lesson of the 20th century is that for all theirs warts, free market economies outperform centrally planned socialist and communist economies. This lesson was writ large in the collapse of the Soviet Union, the conversion of the People’s Republic of China to capitalism, and the ongoing economic malaise of the EU. And yet, the Obama administration simply refuses to learn; Obama is just too tightly bound to the principles of socialism.

Tracy, to be intellectually honest, you need to also note the context of government intervention during the Obama intervention (deep recession). Without intervention, unemployment would be much higher. Tens of thousands of GM and Chrysler workers and thousands more parts suppliers would be unemployed, many more major banks would be out of business, and therefore many more of the rest of us would be out of work too. You might say that despite all of this, we would be better off in the long run. I would disagree because of the opportunities lost in the meantime but would feel that you are stating yours and Obama’s positions fairly.

Still a lot of good stuff around from Roosevelt’s public works employment projects. Government should just do the hiring itself as a countercyclical force — or at the very least, not be laying people off when unemployment is high.

The idea that “Green” jobs can save a country has been tried and found to be a failure. Spain tried it, check out how they are doing. This is the most inept adminstration in U.S. History where jobs are concerned. If you saw the job figures today, ZERO growth, first time since 1945.